Pitcher, "Peace and Independence"

Description:

This creamware pitcher is decorated with a transfer print reading “Peace and Independence” on one side and an “Emblem of America” on the other. “Peace and Independence” is surrounded by a military motif of a canon, an American eagle with outstretched wings, and an American flag with sixteen stars. The emblem of America is an oval design featuring an allegorical figure of Columbia flanked by two small Native Americans. At her right are oval portraits of Columbus, Americus, Sir Walter Raleigh, George Washington, Ben Franklin, John Adams, and Thomas Jefferson.

This pitcher is part of the McCauley collection of American themed transfer print pottery. There is no mark on the pitcher to tell us who made it, but it is characteristic of wares made in large volume for the American market in both Staffordshire and Liverpool between 1790 and 1820. Pitchers of this shape, with a cream colored glaze over a pale earthenware clay, known as Liverpool type, were the most common vessels to feature transfer prints with subjects commemorating events and significant figures in the early decades of United States’ history. Notwithstanding the tense relationship between Britain and America, Liverpool and Staffordshire printers and potters seized the commercial opportunity offered them in the production of transfer printed earthenwares celebrating the heroes, the military victories, and the virtues of the young republic, and frequently all of these things at once.

Location: Currently not on view

Place Made: United Kingdom: England, Liverpool

See more items in: Home and Community Life: Ceramics and Glass, Government, Politics, and Reform, Domestic Furnishings, McCauley Liverpool Pottery

Exhibition:

Exhibition Location:

Credit Line: Robert H. McCauley

Data Source: National Museum of American History

Id Number: CE.63.139Catalog Number: 63.139Accession Number: 248619Collector/Donor Number: 47-373

Object Name: pitcher

Physical Description: monochrome, black (overall surface decoration color name)ceramic, earthenware, refined (overall material)transfer printed (overall production method/technique)Measurements: overall: 8 11/16 in x 9 in x 6 in; 22.06625 cm x 22.86 cm x 15.24 cm

Guid: http://n2t.net/ark:/65665/ng49ca746a3-d803-704b-e053-15f76fa0b4fa

Record Id: nmah_572520

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